American Veterinary Review, 
JANUARY, 1878 . 
ORIGINAL ARTICLES. 
FORMATION OF THE CORPUS LUTEUM. 
Notes from a Lecture by Professor Dalton, Delivered at the American 
Veterinary Coli.ege. 
-- 
On Saturday morning, December 10th, 1877, at the American Vet¬ 
erinary College, Professor Liautard, in the presence of Professors J. C. 
Dalton, T. G, Thomas and others, successfully removed by means of 
the ecraseur, per vaginum, both ovaries of a gray mare about eighteen 
years of age. After the operation, Professor Dalton said to the class : 
“ Gentlemen : I am in hopes the mare from which these ovaries 
have just been taken, has regularly been in heat up to the present time, 
although I doubt, from the external appearance of the organs, if we 
shall find such to have been the case. 
“We desire to see how the corpus luteum is formed, but if the ani¬ 
mal has not been in heat for a lengthened period of time, we shall be 
disappointed in our expectations; for the corpus luteum is formed as 
the result of ovulation, so that when these regular processes cease, the 
formation of corpora lutea ceases also But although this should prove 
to be the condition of the ovaries we are about to examine, we shall 
still see the characters presented by the organs after the cessation of 
the regular periods of heat, or what we call, in the human female, the 
menspanse. 
“ The ovary is composed of a collection of closed sacs or follicles, 
called Graafian follicles, embedded in a mass of connective tissue. At 
first these follicles were believed to be the true eggs, but in 1827, this 
theory was disproved by Von Baer’s discovery of a microscopical egg 
within the follicle. The diameter of this egg is about tIe of an inch. 
